


One Loss

by Lunarelle



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Death, Loss, M/M, Sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-30
Updated: 2018-12-30
Packaged: 2019-09-30 14:29:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17225777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lunarelle/pseuds/Lunarelle
Summary: Jason Blossom is dead, and Archie has to deal with feelings he's had about him.  Feelings he doesn't understand, and a loss that leaves him devastated.





	One Loss

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: the characters here do not belong to me. I'm simply walking through Riverdale as a fan, nothing more.

I couldn’t believe he was dead.  That he had been murdered.

Sure.  I’d had an affair over the summer with Miss Grundy, but that had only been because I hadn’t been able to be with him.

Him.  He’d had red hair like me.  Beautiful features.

Maybe I should have been attracted to his twin sister, but I couldn’t have done.  He had been the one I’d seen.  The one I’d noticed more than anybody else in school.

Of course, I know that he would have never reciprocated my feelings, even if I’d revealed them to him.  After all, he had been in a relationship with Betty’s sister.  It was clear that he was into girls.  So was I, technically, but there had just been something about him, something mysterious that I’d wanted to discover.  Hair of winter fire… or something similar I’d heard in a movie somewhere.

Had I been in love with him?  I couldn’t know that for sure.  I was only a kid in high school – love was far from my mind.  But I guess I can admit now that I’d been a little infatuated with him.  I’d wanted to be with him.  I’d wanted to be his companion, his friend.

His boyfriend?

Sure.  I guess I’d wanted that.

I’d imagined things I’d had no business imagining.  The shape of him under his clothes.  The way he would taste on my lips.

His…

Everything.

Whether it had been lust, love, or a stupid high school crush, it didn’t matter now, because he was dead and there was nothing I could do about it.  I would go through the motions of being a high school football player, one who wrote music in his spare time for girls, although I knew that my music was really for him. 

The one I’d lost.

_One loss, one summer.  Potential lover, extinguished gloss.  Hair of fire, eyes of gold.  A panther’s ire, a life sold.  Where are you now?  Lost to me.  A desecrated vow and an unanswered plea._

I ran my fingers over the guitar strings, not playing, but humming the melody in my head to the half-formed song in my heart.

One loss.

A loss of life.  His life.  Extinguished forever.  Never to return.

A tear ran down my face, taking with it memories I had of seeing him in the school halls.  My heart had thrummed in my chest on more than one occasion at the sight of him.

Sometimes, my fantasies had been so vivid that I’d almost tasted his lips.  I’d imagined their flavor to be of ripe summer apples.  He’d liked apples.

I’d caught him eating one, once.

My stomach lurched and I suddenly set down my guitar and ran into the house.  My father saw me bolting for the bathroom and called out my name, but I didn’t listen.

I vomited, falling to my knees.  Behind me, I heard my father coming in, and I began to sob, resting my head against my arms.

He placed a hand on my back, rubbing in slow circles.

“It’s all right, son,” he said quietly.  “Everything’s all right.”

I shook my head, “No… it’s not.  He’s dead…”

I heard him take a deep breath, “The two of you were close.”

Blindly, I flushed the toilet and pulled down the lid before struggling to my feet and going to the sink to rinse out my mouth, once with water, then with Listerine.  “No.  We weren’t close.  I didn’t really speak to him.”

“What’s got you so upset then?”

“I guess… I guess I should have tried to get to know him.  But I didn’t.  I was too caught up in my own life to worry about his.”

“You can’t know everyone intimately, Archie,” he said, leaning against the wall and crossing his arms, looking at me.  “His death shouldn’t be on your conscience.”

I shook my head, running a hand over my eyes, “It’s not.  I just wish things hadn’t ended this way.”

“Yeah, I know the feeling.  It’s always difficult to find that someone you know has died.  There’s a…”

“Lost potential,” I finished.

“Exactly.  You could have become friends with him this year, except you’ll never know because of what happened.  And none of that is your fault.  You weren’t there – you couldn’t have prevented what happened.”

I looked at my father, “Was that a veiled attempt to ask me where I was that morning?”

“No, of course not.  I know you didn’t have anything to do with his murder.  But the fact that you’re this upset…”

“I don’t know what to tell you.  I just feel bad for what happened to him.”

“That’s normal – it shows that you have a big heart.  But try not to make yourself sick over it, all right?”

I nodded, “I’ll do my best.”

My best.  What did that mean exactly?  Was I not supposed to grieve for someone that I’d had the potential to love?  I’d wanted him, and he was gone.  I’d never gotten a chance to untangle my feelings for him, much less a chance to talk to him about them.

Would he have been disgusted?  Would he have hated me for it?

There was no way for me to know now, was there?  I could imagine a whole lot, but that was all it would be: a fantasy.  Something that would never come to pass.

One loss.

My loss.

_The end_


End file.
